


Library Ghosts

by damerey_knows



Series: Damerey One Shots 2018 [7]
Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: College AU, F/M, Fluff, Library AU, all the fluffies
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-03
Updated: 2018-08-03
Packaged: 2019-06-21 09:33:37
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,781
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15554784
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/damerey_knows/pseuds/damerey_knows
Summary: Prompt: it’s 3 am and I’m still in the library studying for finals and I’m losing my grip on reality and I think I just saw a ghost





	Library Ghosts

**Author's Note:**

> Hey would you look at that, two stories in one week.... Turns out being on vacation with crappy wifi and a rainy beach makes me hella productive.... Enjoy :D
> 
> (Also I am going to be going on a twenty hour car trip to get back home tomorrow, if there is any prompts you would like to see let me know and I will work on them in the car and post them when I get home :D)
> 
> <3  
> Jumana

It was getting to that point in the school year where Poe just wanted to say “Fuck it” and go hide in his apartment for the rest of the year. Okay, so that feeling started two weeks after he started his second year of grad school. Now, however, with winter break _so close_ he could almost taste his father’s pumpkin pie, it was almost unbearable. Having to deal with panicked freshmen looking for the “ _Only book on earth that could save their scholarship_ ” while trying to keep up with his own graduate classes and finals schedule was not something he looked forward to.

As he clocked in for his graveyard shift on Thursday he noticed the pretty brunette girl he’d seen yesterday sitting in the same armchair she had been at yesterday. She had a blue school hoodie on and was balancing a huge textbook on her lap while consulting three others and a laptop on the table in front of her. Even looking tired and a little frazzled she was still stunning.

Okay, so Poe may be harboring a minor (minute, miniscule) crush on her. She came in two or three times a week during the regular school year, but it seemed that she found a second home here during the library’s 24-hour finals schedule.

Poe took his seat at the help desk and pulled out his laptop to finish proofing his essay for Professor Erso. That was one class he was not looking to screw up. That woman was 5’3” of pure intimidation. Rumor had it that she’d been an MI6 operative when she was younger, and Poe didn’t doubt it.

After rewriting the same sentence four times, Poe sat up and rubbed his eyes. He stood from his stool to stretch when he heard a sharp, startled yelp coming from the armchairs. Looking up Poe saw the profile of the brunette girl. She was sitting bolt upright, staring into the deserted stacks. Poe glanced at the clock on his computer, 3am. _She probably just startled herself awake_ , he thought, absently as he sat back down to try to finish the conclusion before calling it quits for the night.

Before he could get too lost in the politics of long dead economists again, a soft, accented voice broke through his thought process.

“Umm, hi.”

Poe looked up and saw the girl standing in front of the information desk, looking at him with a frightened expression on her face. “Hi,” he said, giving her a friendly smile.

“Can I ask you a weird question?” she asked, her hands twisting in front of her.

“Sure…” Poe said, hesitantly.

“Umm, have you—did you ever—” she stopped herself and took a deep breath. “I’ve been here for about forty hours and I don’t trust my own instincts right now—or really even distinguishing reality from my head—but do you know if the library is haunted?”

“Haunted?” he asked, a bemused smile spreading across his face. That wasn’t anything close to what he was expecting.

“Stupid question,” she muttered to herself, a blush rising to the apples of her cheeks. “Never mind.” She said as she turned back to go back to her armchair.

“Wait!” he almost shouted. This was the longest conversation he’d managed to have with her, sue him. “No, I just mean. The library was renovated like three years ago. If anything got…” he stumbled over the right word. “Disturbed, someone would have probably started a rumor then. Hell, someone might even have started a rumor just to try to get a clear table.”

She didn’t look completely reassured. The blush deepening a little.

“I could check it out, if you want,” he offered.

She was hugging herself, and just looked so exhausted. “No, no. It’s okay.”

“You sure?”

She nodded and took a deep breath. “Yeah, I’ll be fine. It was probably just my imagination coupled with the obscene amount of world history reading I’ve been trying to catch up on…” she trailed off, scrubbing her hands over her eyes.

Poe looked around the mostly deserted floor of the library. The last day of finals was tomorrow, well later today, so most of the students were finished and were already beginning to disappear from campus. Poe’s desk was also in one of the less trafficked areas of the library, so it felt like they were the only two in the entire building. “Umm, you can come sit up here with me if you’d like some company,” he said, gesturing to the empty stool next to him, then immediately feeling hot around the collar. _She’s tired and a little freaked out, not the time to be weird._

She brightened at his suggestion, and Poe tried really hard not to blush when she smiled widely at him. “You don’t mind?”

He shrugged. “To be quite honest, I’d rather answer crazy questions about ghosts than ridiculously intense ones about Game Theory.”

“Econ major?” she asked, head cocked to the side, studying him.

“Econ grad student.”

“Cool,” she said. “I’mma grab my things and be right back.”

 Poe nodded and tried not to stare at her as she walked back to the armchair and collected her things haphazardly.

He smiled when she dumped her half open bookbag and coat under the info desk and set her laptop in front of her.

“So, what are you working on?” she asked, casually.

“My final essay for Professor Erso,” he said, rubbing his eyes. “God, I hope this goes well.”

“She hard on you?” the girl asked, a small smile playing at the corner of her mouth.

“She’s hard on everyone,” Poe said, honestly.

“Oh, believe me, I know.” That smile was still there, almost taunting him.

“You ever take her class?”

“Nope,” she said with confidence.

“It’s just,” Poe started and trailed off. “Have you ever had a professor who you wanted to impress, but couldn’t even begin to figure out where to start?”

The smile turned into a giggle at that. “Oh, absolutely,” the girl responded between giggles.

“What?” Poe asked, bemused at her continued laughter.

The girl rolled her eyes. “Nothing.” She turned back to her laptop and began to google something.

Poe stared at her for a moment, before turning back to his own essay. They worked in silence for a few moments before the girl giggled again and broke the silence.

“If you want her to be impressed with you, you should start using footnotes, in addition to your bibliography at the end. She hates random citations.”

“What?” Poe looked up at her, mind still on the wording of the sentence he’d been editing.

“Your citations,” she said, pointing to his screen. “If you really want to impress Professor Erso, you should use footnotes instead of in text citations. It’s one of her pet peeves.”

Poe studied her face for a moment. “I thought you’d never taken her class, how do you know that?”

The girl laughed brightly. “Because I’ve been listening to her complain about essay structure for a while.”

That didn’t make any sense to Poe. Why did she know Professor Erso’s habits?

“You think essays are bad, just think about how bad it was playing hooky once in high school,” she said with a sardonic laugh.

“Are—are you related to Professor Erso?” Poe asked. It was the only reason his tired brain could think to connect the dots.

“She’s my mum. I’m Rey Andor.”

“Poe Dameron,” Poe responded, a little dumbstruck.

“Well it’s nice to meet you, Poe.” Rey’s smile widened as she turned back to her laptop.

Poe laughed. Of all the people he could have developed a crush on, he just had to go have one on the daughter of one of his strictest professors. Not that he was worried that Professor Erso would base his grades on his relationship status, but still. “Nice to meet you, too, Rey.”

They worked in silence for a little while before an idea struck Poe.

“Okay, so, level with me,” he said turning on his stool to face Rey. “Is there any merit to the MI6 rumor?”

Rey looked like she was trying to chew her lip off to keep from smiling, resolutely keeping her eyes on her laptop screen. “Maybe.” The way she drew out the syllables made Poe sit up straighter in his chair.

“What!”

Rey rolled her eyes at him. “C’mon, Poe, it’s all classified.” She giggled when she saw Poe’s slack jawed expression.

“C’mon, you can’t leave me hanging like that,” Poe groans.

Rey smiled a wide, innocent smile and went back to her research.

Poe stared at her for a moment before deciding that she wasn’t going to say anything else and going back to his paper; adding in the changes she suggested.

A few hours passed in silence as they worked. They were both startled when Finn came to take over the info desk at six.

“Hey, Rey,” Finn said as he walked up to the desk. “Didn’t know you worked here too.”

Rey, who had started nodding off on her laptop, smiled tiredly. “Nope, just making friends.”

Poe smiled as he collected his things. “You headed out?” he asked Rey as she stood and stretched.

“Yeah,” she said, a muscle in her neck popping. “I should get a few hours sleep before this test tonight.”

“Can I walk you home?” he asked as they began walking away from the desk. “I mean, if it’s not weird,” he added, awkwardly. He could hear Finn guffawing behind him. Discretely, Poe held his hand behind his back and flipped him the bird without taking his eyes off Rey.

“That would be nice, I'm in McCabe Hall,” she said, rubbing at her eye as they walked. “Fair warning though, I might fall asleep walking.”

“Eh,” Poe shrugged as they passed through the front doors of the library. “We’ve all been there.”

Rey let out a slightly hysterical laugh as her hand slid through Poe’s elbow and she leaned her head on his shoulder. “Just make sure I don’t run into any trees or anything.”

Poe looked down at her, trying not to let a blush rise to his cheeks. Her eyes were closed and she was humming something as they walked down the empty street. “Sure thing,” he said as they paused at an intersection. He'd figure out how to ask her out when she was conscious. At least now he had her phone number. Maybe he'd actually manage it without putting his foot in his mouth. As they passed the parking garage Poe sighed and looked around at the nearly deserted street, wishing he could freeze this moment with this beautiful girl forever.

**Author's Note:**

> So what'd you think?
> 
> -Jumana


End file.
